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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Aristotle" data-source="post: 1865406" data-attributes="member: 5885">Some interesting stuff here, thanks for discussing this with me. I think its cool to think of this as an extension to a D&D style world (with the same level of magic availability and such). I find the "time of troubles" idea interesting as it doesn't totally shut magic down but it makes it unpredicable enough to allow for technology of all sorts to develop faster. DMScott, you make an interesting argument. I think in a standard D&D world magic truly would completely dominate certain fields (medicine being an obvious example). I'm hoping the scaled down magic of the setting I am proposing will make it slightly more believable, but I agree that a certain amount of hand waiving is inevitable. A few notes about the setting I would like to build... 1.) I want to use Modern d20, and I specifically like that character's can't learn magic until they've invested several character levels towards it. And I like that magic is generally a little less powerful than the standard of D&D. 2.) I absolutely don't want magic to be the standard. Businesses burnt coal and developed new mundane ways to produce energy for the same reason the standard fantasy household burns wood in the fireplace. Magic isn't something that everyone has access to, and the costs (and manpower) it would take to generate a constant flow of magical energy to power production would make it prohibitive. <<of course this assumes that it is impossible to make any sort of magic engine or reactor that focuses magical energy on a constant or scheduled basis without need for a human element (or with need for one for that matter, since humans can only harness so much spell energy in a given time frame (spells per day)). That isn't to say that charged items don't exist (like wands and staves), but they aren't rolling off production lines by any means. I'd like to avoid 'magic missle guns' being the standard. I might be open to the possability of some major magical power source (on par with today's nuclear technology)... but the size of the arcane reactor, not to mention the cost of operating one, would put the same sorts of limitations on it that today's nuclear technology has (it provides power to homes regionally and has even been scaled down to power very large vehicles (space/planar, air, and water; but it won't power your car or your watch.)</blockquote>

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